James Blake is a stubborn man.

Blake kept his old racquets strung at some ridiculously high tension for years even when he didn’t have a contract, even when the racquet was no longer being made.

Blake’s style is to be aggressive.  In a way, he’s like Roger Federer.  He wants to attack the ball early, give his opponents little time to react and end the points quickly.  When he was at his best, years ago, he was able to befuddle opponents and took this strategy to a top ten ranking.  Since then, injuries and a style that was erratic at best caught up with him and his ranking began to plummet.

Blake has only been able to move his ranking up, getting some key wins, but has had to play Challengers to get his ranking up including a win at Sarasota and Winnetka.

With two marathon matches played today (Nadal-Verdasco and Ferrer-Simon), this match went by in a blink.  In a way, it was like the two had been transported to five years ago.

Blake, stubborn as ever, chose to return serve very close to the service line as if he were playing doubles.  This meant he couldn’t get solid returns consistently.  Federer got easy points, and even when Blake managed a return, Federer would often hit his inside-out forehand to the sideline for a winner.

In less than an hour, Federer won 6-4, 6-1.

At the same time, Gael Monfils took on Philipp Kohlschreiber.  This match was similarly short with Monfils winning 6-2, 6-2.

This leads to the following quarterfinals.

Djokovic takes on Monfils.  The two just played last week, with Djokovic playing his best match at Montreal.  You would think this match would be even given Monfils athleticism.  The only thing that Monfils has going for him is that Djokovic hasn’t looked that sharp.  Having said that, he didn’t look that sharp last week before he met Monfils and he looked very good against Monfils.  I suspect Djokovic will feel good playing Monfils again and that will carry him to the win.  I think Monfils will play a closer match but Djokovic will ultimately win.

Federer takes on Berdych.  Last year, Berdych got Federer twice, once in Miami and once at Wimbledon.  Since then, Berdych’s game has come down some, but they did meet once again in Toronto and Federer won this in a third set tiebreak.  Berdych has been losing left and right, but has managed to stay in the top ten.  Berdych also had a surprisingly easy win against Almagro, a player that has had a good summer and is normally very tough to beat easily.  This may mean Berdych’s game is back on the rise again which would be some bad timing for Federer.

Federer has to be very careful in this match given how well Berdych has played his two matches.  I see this going the distance.

Murray takes on Gilles Simon.  Murray leads 6-1 with the only loss in their first meeting in 2007, which was on clay.  Surprisingly, Murray has a favorable record over Simon on clay, although Simon most probably prefers hard courts given his flatter style of play.  Simon makes you hit lots of balls, so Murray will look to play aggressive.  I think this will be a good test for Murray and may be tougher for Murray unless he serves particularly well (which means winning free points on his serve, not so much first serve percentage).

Finally, Rafael Nadal takes on Mardy Fish.  Fish has never beaten Nadal.  Nadal played a long match to beat Verdasco then came out to play doubles, although that was a very quick loss.  If Fish has a chance to upset Nadal, this would seem to be it.  If Nadal comes out and plays better tennis, it could be tough for Fish.  If he comes out and plays like today, Fish has a good shot of beating Nadal.  Fish has had some good wins over players that could have troubled him, in particular, Davydenko and Gasquet.

Simon and Murray play first tomorrow to cater to the tennis hungry UK while Djokovic will be tomorrow night’s featured match.  Fish-Nadal starts at 1 PM and Federer-Berdych starts at 2:30 or later.